Hydrogen is generally considered to be a clean fuel because in many applications, it can be burned to produce energy and water. That is, the waste product produced in generating energy from burning hydrogen is only water. Other problems persist in using hydrogen as a fuel though, including the ability to obtain or generate hydrogen in real time or to store it in sufficient quantities to be useful as a fuel.
Hydrogen furnaces are one example where it would be beneficial to use hydrogen as a fuel in heating a home or a building, for example. One problem that currently exists as a barrier to more widespread use is the delivery and storage of hydrogen gas to the building site. It is generally known in the art that hydrogen can be generated by reacting aluminum in a solution of water and sodium hydroxide, however, making use on a scale large enough to extract sufficient amounts of hydrogen for domestic or commercial use has been problematic.
Other similar reactions where a solid material is reacted with a liquid phase solution to produce a gas also face similar problems, in carrying out the reaction while extracting the gas in a useful and on-demand type of fashion.
Furthermore, some of the energy resulting from this reaction is often wasted as the target is to extract gas from the reaction. It may also be beneficial to make use of the heat byproduct, where it exists such as in the aluminum and sodium hydroxide reaction.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to provide a reactor for reacting a solid material such as aluminum in a solution, such as sodium hydroxide, to produce a gas.